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Hearing in the Finance and Taxation Committee gathered reports from parliamentarians on the retention of cards by traffickers in exchange for drugs, while the Ministry of Social Development counters the association with scientific data
Recent cases recorded by police authorities in different states of the country have reopened a delicate debate: the use of cards and resources from Bolsa Família in incidents related to drug purchases and trafficking. The topic returned to the national agenda after a public hearing held in the Finance and Taxation Committee of the Chamber of Deputies, which discussed reports of retention of program cards by traffickers in exchange for delivering drugs to homeless beneficiaries of the social policy.
Although isolated episodes of this type were already known by public security agents in different regions of the country, the multiplication of officially confirmed cases — through police reports, Public Prosecutor’s Office investigations, and police operations — has given more weight to the debate. In this sense, the discussion is not limited to a specific city or state but emerges as a pattern observed in different parts of the national territory, from the South to the Northeast.
The hearing, held on June 9, was requested by Deputy Kim Kataguiri (Mission-SP). During the meeting, Joinville Councilman Mateus Batista (Union-SC) reported having heard complaints from public agents in various Brazilian cities about homeless people leaving their Bolsa Família card with traffickers as a form of payment for drugs. “We heard these reports in several places: in Chapecó, in Joinville, in Florianópolis, in São Paulo, in all the cities I visited,” said the councilman during the session, according to records of the hearing itself.
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According to Batista, what caught his attention was what he described as the ease of access to the benefit by the homeless population, especially following regulatory changes implemented from 2023. The information was published on June 26, 2026, by the portal Gazeta do Povo, in a report signed by journalist Leonardo Desideri.
Inclusion of homeless people in the social program and the accelerated growth of the eligible public
The discussion around the topic gained momentum after the federal government included, in 2025, families with homeless individuals among the priority groups for entry into Bolsa Família. The measure came into effect through an ordinance in July 2025, published by the Ministry of Social Development and Assistance, Family and Fight against Hunger (MDS).
In this sense, data from CadÚnico shows a significant increase in the number of homeless people registered: from 198.7 thousand in December 2022 to 392.4 thousand in June 2026 — a rise of 97.4% over the period. Although there is no recent national survey that specifically quantifies how many of these people are substance-dependent, a federal government report published in August 2023 already indicated that 29% of homeless people declared alcoholism or drug use as one of the reasons for being in this condition.
Currently, Bolsa Família serves 19.3 million families — equivalent to about 50.1 million people — with a monthly investment of R$ 13 billion, according to data from the MDS itself. Given these numbers, the program consolidates itself as one of the largest income transfer policies in the world, which, according to social assistance experts, makes the debate on control mechanisms and monitoring of specific cases of extreme vulnerability, such as homeless people with a history of substance dependence, even more relevant.
It is worth noting, however, that the priority inclusion of homeless people in the program was conceived precisely as a response to a growing social vulnerability scenario in large Brazilian cities. According to experts in the field, removing this group from the reach of income transfer policies would tend to further aggravate the situation of social exclusion experienced by this population — which makes the challenge of balancing social protection and adequate oversight even more complex.
Officially confirmed cases show cards used as currency by criminals
Different episodes documented by police authorities and investigative bodies reinforce the frequency of this type of misuse. In Caçador, Santa Catarina, an official publication of the 15th Military Police Battalion recorded, in June 2026, the seizure of a handmade marijuana cigarette along with a Bolsa Família card — a case that, according to the corporation itself, directly illustrates the recurrence of this pattern in routine approaches.
In Birigui, in the interior of São Paulo, the Military Police arrested, in 2025, a couple for drug trafficking after finding cocaine, materials used in the preparation of narcotics, and several Bolsa Família cards in the names of third parties inside the suspects’ residence. The presence of multiple cards belonging to other people, according to investigators, is usually a relevant indication that the social benefit was being used as part of the payment scheme for drugs.
In São José do Rio Preto, also in the interior of São Paulo, the Special Action Group to Combat Organized Crime (Gaeco) of the São Paulo Public Prosecutor’s Office launched, in 2024, the so-called Operation Bolsa Crack — aimed at a criminal association that exploited homeless crack users, retaining their cards as a guarantee of payment for the consumed drug. According to the MPSP, the investigation identified a structured scheme, in which the control of the cards functioned as a mechanism of financial submission of the victims to the criminal group.
On the other hand, one of the most serious cases within this scenario occurred in Remígio, Paraíba, in September 2024. According to a report by the site Metrópoles, a 63-year-old woman and her 16-year-old grandson were murdered due to a conflict involving the Bolsa Família card of the victim’s daughter — used by a faction to make withdrawals in exchange for drugs. The crime was allegedly motivated by retaliation after the elderly woman demanded the return of the card, highlighting how this type of relationship between beneficiaries and criminal organizations can, in extreme situations, lead to fatal outcomes.
In light of this scenario, Congressman Kim Kataguiri advocates a specific measure to try to reduce this type of occurrence: the requirement for periodic attendance at social assistance centers, so that identified drug users can have their benefits temporarily suspended and be referred to specialized psychiatric and psychological treatment. According to the parliamentarian, this would be a way to reconcile the social monitoring of the beneficiary with effective mechanisms to prevent the misuse of public resources.
Government rebuts association between the program and drug trafficking with scientific data
On the other hand, the Ministry of Development and Social Assistance publicly rejects the thesis that Bolsa Família favors drug trafficking. On an official page combating misinformation, the government classifies this association as false, citing a study conducted by Fiocruz in partnership with Harvard University. According to the research, program beneficiaries showed a 17% lower risk of hospitalization for substance use-related disorders.
The study, published in the scientific journal The Lancet Global Health, analyzed data from 35 million people between the years 2008 and 2015. According to the MDS, the results indicate a 26% reduction in the risk of hospitalizations related to alcohol use and an 11% reduction in the risk of hospitalization for other substances among the beneficiaries monitored.
During the hearing in the Chamber, the MDS representative, Edson Moreira Lima, reinforced that the central objective of Bolsa Família is the immediate relief of poverty and hunger. According to him, addressing chemical dependency should occur through other public policies — especially at the state and municipal levels — focusing on support and treatment, and not by automatically withdrawing the benefit.
Still, there is currently no national survey that accurately measures how much money from the Bolsa Família is effectively directed towards drug purchases or captured by criminal organizations. This occurs, in part, because the illegal drug trade is less traceable than other forms of diversion, such as the volume of program resources directed to online sports betting — a phenomenon that already has more consolidated official measurement, precisely because it involves transactions recorded on regulated digital platforms.
There is also a related front of investigation involving the use of beneficiaries’ accounts in money laundering schemes linked to organized crime, as reported by Gazeta do Povo itself in 2025. Reports from the Financial Activities Control Council (Coaf), sent to the Federal Police and the Public Prosecutor’s Office, identified suspicious financial movements in the accounts of social program beneficiaries during investigations into fintechs used by the PCC — including the case of a 32-year-old woman who, according to investigations, was used as a “straw person” to move R$ 3.3 million between October 2022 and March 2023.
This type of scheme, according to investigators, tends to differ from cases of direct diversion for drug purchases precisely because of the sophistication involved: while the retention of cards by traffickers usually occurs directly and informally, the use of accounts for money laundering often involves more elaborate financial structures, with the movement of amounts far exceeding what would normally circulate in a beneficiary’s account of the program.
Given such divergent positions between parliamentarians and the federal government, the debate on the misuse of Bolsa Família remains open. On one side, police reports and testimonies from public agents reinforce the perception that the diversion of purpose is a recurring reality in different regions of the country. On the other, the federal government argues that scientific data proves exactly the opposite: that access to the program reduces, rather than increases, the risk of substance-related hospitalizations among its beneficiaries.
Therefore, more than pointing to a single culprit, the case highlights the complexity of balancing social protection for vulnerable populations with effective monitoring mechanisms — a challenge that, according to experts heard by the report, will hardly be resolved with isolated measures alone, requiring coordination between different levels of government and specific public health policies. In this sense, the topic is likely to remain at the center of political and social debate in the coming months, especially given the proximity of new budget discussions and the pressure for clearer results on the program’s impact on the lives of its beneficiaries.
